Resounding confession

An Indian Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has confessed what most of his colleagues in Parliament know but would rather not say for obvious reasons. The confession came about towards the conclusion of his visit to the Kashmir Valley. He remarked that India’s media was biased while New Delhi’s Kashmir policy was being run by intelligence agencies. If such words had been uttered by any foreigner or worse still some Pakistani observer they would have been ridiculed as hogwash but since they have been made by an active member of Indian political life they are first of all closer to reality and secondly a gross indictment of India’s illegal occupation of Kashmir.

And on the list of such conscientious Indians criticising their state’s authoritarian character figures a former Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court Rajinder Sacher who stated that India was persecuting its Muslim population in the name of terrorism. His observation that any state that does not accord its minorities their proper place in society cannot be called civilised, debunks the myth that India is a shining democracy. These are Indian’s own intellectuals and leaders who have started to criticise their state and intelligence agencies for their atrocious behaviour. New Delhi can neither prevail with the occupation nor can it continue to masquerade as a democratic society.